By Paul Lienert and Joseph White
DETROIT, Sept 4 (Reuters) - From his laboratory at
Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University, automated vehicle
pioneer Raj Rajkumar says self-driving cars will evolve
step-by-step, with humans staying in charge for a long time to
come.
More than 2,500 miles west in Mountain View, California,
Chris Urmson, head of Google Inc 's GOOGL.O self-driving car
program since 2009, has a different view: A fully automated
vehicle that requires no input or intervention from humans is a
safer choice, and one that could be ready for production by
2020.
Partially automating a car can reduce certain accident
risks, but can also create new safety challenges not easily
solved by current technology. Urmson, one of Rajkumar's former
colleagues at Carnegie Mellon, said he worries that drivers
could muff the handoff when an automated system suddenly demands
they start making decisions about where to steer.
"The better the technology gets," he said, "the less
reliable the driver is going to get."
Google's all-in approach differs from the auto industry's
strategy on autonomous vehicle technology that will manifest
itself in vehicles consumers can buy over the next two to three
years.
Mainstream automakers General Motors Co (NYSE:GM) GM.N and
Volkswagen (XETRA:VOWG) AG VOWG_p.DE and newcomer Tesla Motors Inc TSLA.O
are pushing down the road to automation outlined by Rajkumar.
They are accelerating plans to bring automated driving to the
market in stages, starting as early as this year. A small group
of Tesla owners is testing its "Autopilot" system that will
allow hands-free highway cruising and automated parking. Tesla
said it expects to offer the technology more widely later this
year.
Technology that allows a car to park itself is already on
the market, and a growing number of vehicles are equipped with
systems that automatically apply the brakes, correct the
steering or maintain a set distance from a vehicle ahead in the
lane.
The automakers' rush to partially automated driving is
moving faster than regulators can prescribe new rules of the
road. Some experts - Urmson is one - are concerned that drivers
may not respond well to cars that let them surrender control for
long stretches.
Alerting a driver to retake control during an emergency is
one of the biggest safety challenges for manufacturers of
partially automated cars, industry officials and scientists
said.
Depending on the level of automation and intensity of alert,
some drivers took an average of 17 seconds to respond to a
takeover request and regain control of the vehicle, in a study
just released by the National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration and supported by Google and several leading
automakers and suppliers. In that time, a car traveling at 60
miles per hour would travel more than a quarter of a mile.
Time to respond and regain control was reduced to just a few
seconds when visual and audible warnings were accompanied by
non-visual alerts such as a nudge from a mechanism in the seat.
But "there were alerts that were missed" by some study
participants, NHTSA said. When drivers shift their attention to
other tasks in a self-driving vehicle, such as sending an
e-mail, "their readiness to respond to driving-related prompts
and alerts can be delayed."
There's value in "driver assistance" features such as brakes
that engage automatically when the car's sensors detect an
imminent crash, Urmson said. But a fully automated vehicle "can
be much safer than a driver assistance system can ever be."
The behavior of drivers in automated cars is one issue.
Another is the interaction between robot cars and those piloted
by people. Google's Urmson has highlighted that issue in
dissecting the causes of a series of incidents in which the
company's self-driving cars were hit by conventional vehicles.
REAR-ENDED
In an August 20 incident, a Google self-driving prototype
was rear-ended while stopped for a pedestrian in a crosswalk
near the company's Mountain View headquarters. At the time, the
driver of the Google vehicle had taken manual control after the
car had begun to automatically brake for the pedestrian. Urmson
speculated that the driver of the other vehicle may have glanced
away while changing lanes.
Unresolved questions aren't stopping automakers and
automotive suppliers from cashing in on partial automation, in
part because the incremental approach promises more revenue in
the near term than keeping technology in the lab.
Automotive technology companies such as Continental AG
CONG.DE and Silicon Valley names such as chipmaker Nvidia Corp
NVDA.O are working with automakers on semi-automated systems
as well as supporting Google's project. Last month, Delphi
Automotive Plc DLPH.N , a global auto supplier in the forefront
of automated vehicle development, acquired Ottomatika, a CMU
spinout that originated in Rajkumar's lab.
Semi-automated driver assistance systems are expected to add
$3,000 or more to the cost of cars. There are no consistent
estimates on the cost of a fully automated vehicle.
The entire auto industry is waiting for highway safety
regulators at NHTSA to clarify their position on Tesla's
Autopilot and similar technology.
"The agency is in regular contact with the many companies
that are developing such technologies, and we are working with
all of them to help ensure that these innovations realize their
safety potential," NHTSA said in a statement Aug 31.
In July, NHTSA chief Mark Rosekind said the agency is
reviewing federal vehicle safety rules that could affect
self-driving vehicles. ID:L1N1001QT
"We are trying to figure out if innovation will run up
against regulations," Rosekind said.